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I was going to write an explanation of my personal Turkey Day tradition, but then I realized that I did the same thing last year. So, here’s a nice little copy/paste of that post to make sure everyone understands the lunacy I’ll be putting myself through tomorrow.

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I don’t know how all of you celebrate Thanksgiving (although, I invite you to tell me down in the comments), but I drink all day and watch movies. I mostly watch post-apocalyptic sci-fi, but I start my day off every year with the classic sci-fi-action masterpiece Predator.

Predator?

Now, a little back story. I was at a convention, Wizard World Chicago probably, talking with the awesome Jason Latour, when the subject of holiday movies came up. We talked about Die Hard, and it’s place as the consumate manliest Christmas movie of course, and then he brought up Thanksgiving. Until that time, I’d never really thought of any movie as being a “Thanksgiving” movie. That’s when Latour learned me a little something.

Die Hard : Christmas :: Predator : Thanksgiving

“These are the rules,” he told me, “we don’t make ‘em, we just follow ‘em.” Since then, I’ve watched Predator every year on Turkey Day, ’cause them’s the rules.

Post-Apocalyptic Sci-Fi?

A few years ago, I picked up a DVD set I’d been look for for some time, “Post Apocalyptic Triple Feature“. It’s an awesome set that features three movies I remember renting from the video store as a kid, that pretty directly led to post-apocalyptic sci-fi being my absolute favorite movie sub genre. That year, Thanksgiving rolled around, I was off of work, and had nothing to do. So, I decided to sit my ass down and marathon through all three flicks.

Every year since, I’ve tried my hardest to make time to marathon through as many post-apocalyptic flicks as possible. I’ve always just called it my Post-Apocalyptic Thanksgiving. This year, however, my good buddy Kevin Mellon came up with Hurleysgivingpocalyptageddon, which I’ve now decided is the only applicable name for my special celebration.

Booze?

It’s a fucking holiday, of course there’s alcohol.

There you go folks, a little explanation of the Fall tradition that is Hurleysgivingpocalyptageddon!

Oh, The Asylum, how do I love thee. You’ve seen reviews here for 2-Headed Shark Attack, and 2012: Zombie Apocalypse, in fact, I’ve only reviewed movies from The Asylum since my return earlier this year. It’s no coincidence, they’re kind of my current obsession. I’ve actually watched quite a few of their movies recently that I didn’t write reviews for. However, that’s not the case with Abraham Lincoln Vs. Zombies. This is a movie that deserves a review. Despite being another in The Asylum’s long line of mock busters, it’s pretty dang good.

I’m pretty much a huge Abe Lincoln fan. In fact, several years ago, I made a mini-comic that featured him. Dude was a professional wrestler before he became President. That’s pretty bad ass. With that in mind, it’s easy to see why I was all in for this movie as soon as I heard about it.

This movie, like the amazing 2-Headed Shark Attack, is exactly what the title says it is. Lincoln personally leads an elite team of new Secret Service agents to recapture a fort that has been taken over by Rebel zombies. Boom. That’s a movie. This movie also does a great job of adding some pretty great character moments, and mixing in other historical characters along the way. However, those other historical characters, while a fun addition, are pretty inaccurately portrayed.

Teddy Roosevelt, age 6 – Pat Garrett, age 14

That’s a pretty minor problem in a movie that’s obviously not going for historical accuracy though. It’s also far overshadowed by the fact that Lincoln has his own personal switchblade style scythe, which he apparently keeps in a white house closet just in case he needs that shit for a zombie outbreak. Seriously.

I really, really enjoyed this flick, and while it had some problems, it was still hella fun. Oh yeah, the ending is pretty damn clever too.

KC area artist Rob Schamberger is trying to raise money via Kickstarter for a really cool project. He wants to do a portrait of every single World Heayweight Champion. There are tons of really sweet incentives at every donation level, but there are only a few more days to pledge. If you’re a wrestling fan or a fine art fan, I highly encourage you to check this out, and pledge if you can.

That title’s a little misleading. It almost makes it sound like I didn’t want to see The Avengers at all, which, I assure you, was not the case. I really, really wanted to see this movie, I simply didn’t want to have to watch it in 3D.

This Sunday, my brother Nathan and I decided to go see The Avengers. When I arrived at my local theater, Nathan, who had arrived about 30 minutes early for the show, informed me that the 2D show was sold out. My theater, by the way, had one screen showing Avengers in 2D, and three screens showing the 3D version. We were trying to get to the earliest screening possible, as I had some appointments in the afternoon, so our choices came down to waiting another day to see the movie, or just seeing it in 3D. We debated our choices for a while, and as we did, several more people came up to the window wanting tickets to the sold out 2D showing. The workers at the box office informed them that the 2D showing was sold out, but that a 3D showing started just 15 minutes later. Of the 20 or so people I saw go through this scenario, the vast majority did not opt to see the 3D movie, instead, they simply left.

That’s right, rather than pay more money to watch the same movie, they went home.

My brother and I opted to pay the extra money, however, since we didn’t have another time in the coming days to see it together. We hopped in line, and when we got to the ticket window, I realized that the man working there was actually the theater’s manager. I purchased my ticket, and told him that I was doing it begrudgingly. He sympathized, and told me that he too wished that they’d had more 2D copies of the film. Then, he threw a little factoid at me that kind of blew my mind. He said that the box office takes for the two versions of the film were actually neck and neck, despite the 2D version being on fewer screens, and a cheaper ticket. I kind of doubted that, and in the interest of full disclosure, I haven’t been able to find anything else that backs that up. However, the view from my seat in the theater really got me thinking.

When the movie finally started, our screening was maybe, and it’s a generous maybe, half full. Some quick back of the envelope math breaks down like so:

Average movie ticket price – $8, Upcharge for 3D – $3 (That’s almost a 40% mark up, by the way), the theaters in our town hold about 300 people each. So, a sold out 2D showing makes $2400 dollars, and 3 half-full 3D showings makes $4,950. Yes, that’s twice as much money, but it took three times as many screens, and 40% higher ticket prices to get there. That doesn’t even take into account the completely lost sales of the people that went home when they heard the 2D showing was sold out!

I loved the movie, it was pretty easily the greatest superhero movie yet, but the 3D didn’t enhance my experience at all. In fact, it detracted from it. The action in the extreme foreground blurs horribly for me in 3D, and the entire experience never fails to give me a headache.

I really hope that 3D is a fad that fades away sooner, rather than later. It’s a gimmick. It doesn’t enhance the movie experience, and it doesn’t seem to be making any extra money for Hollywood at this point. All of this is obviously just my opinion, and your mileage may vary, but this is my blog, and that’s the way I see it.

You guys, I was so excited to see this movie, and it was everything I’d hoped it would be.

This movie is exactly what you’d expect it to be, which is exactly why it was flippin’ awesome.

I’ve become a huge fan of the films put out by The Asylum. I haven’t seen a ton of them so far, but I plan on plugging through their back catalog in the near future. They make movies that are unapologetic about what they are, which is essentially modern grindhouse cinema. Their movies are made to appeal to a certain demographic in a lowest common denominator way, and do so without pulling any punches. 2-Headed Shark Attack is a great example of this.

I honestly don’t know what else to tell you. The movie is called 2-Headed Shark Attack. If you hear the title and think, “That sounds awesome”, then you’ll dig this movie. Period.